Colin Rydell

Colin Rydell
Visiting Assistant Professor

Areas of expertise:     

  • Early modern Britain
  • Transnational food pathways, consumption, and commodity history
  • Colonial America and the Atlantic World
  • Alternative agriculture

Education:

  • Ph.D., University of Chicago (2020)
  • M.A., University of Chicago (2015
  • B.A., University of Denver (2006)

Contact:

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About Colin Rydell

As a new visiting faculty member at FLC, Colin Rydell has been teaching American history and a course incorporating his research on consumption and commodity history, specifically the history of alcohol. Dr. Rydell’s 2023 Spring Semester course, “Alcohol in the Early Modern World,” focuses on various topics intersecting with alcohol consumption, including trade, gender, colonialism, religion, sociability, and health. He was awarded an FLC “Experiential and Community-Engaged Learning” [EXCEL] teaching grant to take students in this course to Fenceline Cider’s production facility to connect historical course readings with the living alcohol traditions of Colorado.  

Apart from his primary role in teaching both intro-level American History sequences, he continues to work on his book manuscript for McGill-Queen’s University Press. This past summer, Dr. Rydell presented a paper titled “Cider as Frontier Colonizer: Stability and Legibility in England and Early America” at the biannual Alcohol Drugs History Society (ADHS) conference in Mexico City and is currently adapting the paper for a journal article. He is enrolled in FLC’s “Empower Pedagogy and Ignite Change” [EPIC] program to spur innovation in teaching methods. He also is arranging to bring the University of Denver’s Dr. Ingrid Tague as this year’s Reece Kelly Lecture series speaker. He serves as a faculty advisor to the College’s Anime club.

Awards and News

2020-2022, Teaching Fellow in the Social Sciences, University of Chicago

2019, Residential Research Fellowship, Winterthur Garden, Museum and Library

2019, The Folger Institute’s Mellon Initiative in Collaborative Research Grant: Before ‘Farm to Table’: Early Modern Foodways and Cultures

2018, Appointed as Bessie Louise Pierce Prize Preceptor, University of Chicago History Department

2017, Research Fellowship, Nicholson Center for British Studies

2017, Research Fellowship, Morris Fishbein Center for the History of Science and Medicine

2016, Mellon Summer Institute in English Paleography, the Huntington Library